Religion, Skepticism, and the A24 Horror Film Heretic

Religion. Rather than approaching this ever-sensitive, deeply personal, and often polarizing subject with answers, I would like to explore its subjectivity and complexities through its portrayal in Scott Beck and Bryan Woods’s A24 horror film, Heretic. For those of you that enjoy a slightly spooky movie with minimum jumpscares, fantastic acting, and breathtaking cinematography (by the legendary Chung-hoon Chung that is), I recommend watching Heretic first as I will be giving spoilers.

A Heretic poster by u/SummerRay on Reddit

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The reason why I watched Heretic was because of a specific scene that I kept seeing on the Internet. While explaining why he finds religions to be questionable, Hugh Grant's character Mr. Reed uses the iterations of the Monopoly games and the similarities between The Hollies' "The Air That I Breathe" and Radiohead's "Creep" songs as analogies to different religions. In this scene, Mr. Reed says that these iterations over time "dilute the message" and "obscure the original".

The Monopoly scene ("The Air That I Breathe" is playing in the background)

The cleverness of the analogies aside, this scene highlights a deeper issue with organized religion: there is a sense that, over time, the original purity and intent of religious teachings have been diluted, reshaped, or even deliberately manipulated to serve human agendas. In other words, what may have begun as a sincere effort to understand the divine or the incomprehensible, in many instances, religion becomes entangled with dogma, politics, and control. Heretic suggests this idea that religion should be questioned not to be blasphemous but to be curious, and this curiosity and skepticism is embedded throughout the movie. The movie invites the viewer to question religion and faith alongside Sophie Thatcher's character Sister Barnes and Chloe East's character Sister Paxton. By presenting these characters who are devout yet vulnerable to manipulation, Heretic emphasizes that beliefs should not be immune to skepticism, especially when they might be used as tools for coercion.

From left to right: Mr. Reed, Sister Barnes, and Sister Paxton

What makes this narrative hit harder is how Beck and Woods approach the subject with ambiguity rather than certainty. The best example of this uncertainty, in my opinion, is the ending of the film. Instead of offering clear answers or closure, the ending leaves the viewers suspended between belief and disbelief, between faith in a miracle and suspicion of a magic trick. Sister Barnes, previously murdered by Mr. Reed, miraculously resurrected, just long enough to save Sister Paxton and kill Mr. Reed. After finding an exit, Sister Paxton sees a butterfly resting gently on her finger, a call back to something she said earlier in the film about how she would communicate with her loved ones from the beyond. However, in the final frame, the butterfly vanishes. It isn’t killed or blown away. It simply disappears, leaving only her empty hand.

The vanishing butterfly

There can be two major interpretations of this ending, representing the core dilemma the film explores: belief vs disbelief. In one sense, the resurrection of Sister Barnes is truly a divine miracle and a sign that Paxton's faith is rewarded. The butterfly, in this version, is not just a symbol but a confirmation that Sister Paxton’s faith, however tested, was not misplaced. Her spiritual convictions are validated in the most supernatural way.

The second and more realistic interpretation of the ending is that Sister Paxton never actually escapes the house because she is, in fact, dead. She bleeds out while praying after being stabbed by Mr. Reed, and everything that follows is a hallucination produced by her brain in its final moments. From this perspective, the apparent resurrection of Sister Barnes, the escape, and even the butterfly are all fabrications of a dying mind clinging to faith. The clues to this interpretation are scattered subtly throughout the film, but none more revealing than the so-called prophecy shared by the so-called prophet.

The prophet eating pie

According to the prophet, just before her own "death," she saw a "conductor" (an angelic figure), "white clouds," and that it was "not heaven." Most crucially, she describes that they "unplugged her brain" and emphasizes, “it’s not real.” Earlier in the film, Sister Barnes dismisses the prophecy not as divine revelation but as a textbook description of a near-death experience and how the oxygen-deprived brain creates visions to ease the transition into death. In this ending, Sister Paxton's mind, starved of blood and oxygen, floods her with visions of a heroic redemption, a divine intervention, and the validation of her faith. The wintery setting mirrors the white clouds, and Sister Barnes is the angel.

Yet even in this comforting dream, reality intrudes. The butterfly, which seemed to be a confirmation of her beliefs, vanishes in the final frame. This small but deliberate detail pulls the viewer out of the fantasy and back into uncertainty. It is as if her mind could only hold onto the illusion for so long before the truth broke through. The disappearance of the butterfly becomes the film’s final, sobering note as it once again begs the question: was it real?

These interpretations align with the theme of Heretic: do we believe or disbelieve? The ending asks the viewers if they still believe in the good ending when the evidence stands against it, or if they choose to side with the realistic yet grim ending at the cost of a happier alternative. In the words of the directors themselves, "the ambition is to deliver questions, and not to necessarily deliver an answer." Heretic aims for each viewer to interpret the ending in their own way, intersecting with their own sense of self and how they view the world. So, the film is not a critique of belief but a critique of certainty. Which is why I invite you, dear reader, to watch the scary but inquisitive film Heretic with an open mind, but maybe with slightly closed eyes.